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The role of national culture interactions is important in operations management and supply chain management decisions. Yet, cross‐cultural research in this field is limited. Our goal in this study is to review relevant research, to raise awareness about the critical role of national culture among operations management and supply chain management researchers, and to offer directions for future research. To achieve this goal, we report our research findings in three major categories: (i) Operational Decisions (innovation, and research and development, quality management, workforce management, performance measurement, and risk, security and disaster management); (ii) Supply Chain Management (buyer–supplier interactions, governance mechanisms, outsourcing, and offshore operations); and (iii) Interdisciplinary Topics (entrepreneurship, investments, joint ventures, and mergers and acquisitions). We also suggest methodological considerations for future research by those interested in studying national culture.

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A first-principles energy-band study of the metallic rutile phase of VO2 using a general crystal potential and an expansion of the Bloch functions in a linear combination of atomic orbitals is reported. The results are compared with previous work and experimental optical, x-ray absorption and emission, and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy data. We obtain a large density of states at the Fermi energy; the Fermi surface is found to be determined by the two lowest d bands, at the bottom of the "t,g" manifold which is split by the orthorhombic field; the lowest-band Fermi surface possesses some nesting features corresponding to a nesting vector i) = I R. A calculation of the generalized susceptibility in the constantmatrix-element approximation shows the existence of a maximum at the zone boundary R. We suggest that the formation of a charge-density wave with wave vector g = I R accompanied by a periodic lattice distortion is thus possible; the subsequent condensation of phonons at the point R could then explain the crystallographic phase transition observed at T = 339 K.

Intermetallic compounds based on hydrogen absorbing elements usually form stable hydrides. This is the case for PdZr2. Surprisingly, ZrPd2 does not absorb hydrogen although both compounds have the same crystal structure and satisfy the empirical geometrical criteria for hydride formation. Results of ab initio calculations reveal an unanticipated purely electronic origin. These results have implications in the search for new intermetallics for hydrogen storage.

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